The Impact of Research and Teaching Evaluation in Universities: Comparing an Italian and a Dutch case

Abstract

This article focuses on the impact of research and education evaluation on two universities: Trento State University (Italy) and the University of Amsterdam (The Netherlands). The article adopts a system approach to evaluation and proposes a model to describe and analyse evaluation systems. The analysis has been carried out by means of in‐depth interviews with key decision‐makers involved in the two universities. The analysis shows that many of the differences in impact can be linked to the different ‘evaluation stages’ the universities are currently in; the Italian university experiencing a number of novel effects, with the Dutch university reaping the benefits (and experiencing some problems) of having institutionalized evaluation practices.

Keywords:

• impact
• teaching evaluation
• research evaluation
• The Netherlands
• Italy

Notes

[1] Formally, at the time of the interviews within the University of Amsterdam the Dutch quality assurance system changed, in the context of the Bologna Process, to a system of accreditation (see Dittrich et al., 2004). However, implementation at the time of the interviews had only been realized for a few disciplines. The interviewees were prompted to reflect on the ‘old’ evaluation system and practice.